Marina Bay Sands (MBS) Hotel Stay

I used to wonder why people got to have free MBS hotel stay just because their parents went to its casino. 

My fourth sister, the one who resides in Malaysia, started asking us if we would like to stay over at MBS on weekends, with all meals thrown in, since last year.

Until now, I am still not sure how it works, but it seems you need to deposit a certain amount of money at the casino before withdrawing it, in order to be a registered guest of some sort. By gambling at the casino, you get to chalk up points. Whether you lose or win, the points you get when playing at the casino are the points you chalk up. According to my sister, they upgraded her for reasons that she knew not to that of the Paiza status. Such guests have the VIP status and they are offered free stays at Paiza rooms, usually large and luxurious at high levels, at MBS provided they come down personally to MBS to register for the stay.

I have since stayed at the hotel for quite a few times. I always go there with my mother as she loves the hotel stay and goes to the casino.

Last weekend, my sister gave us a 2-day stay, 24 to 26 May. 

Due to my work commitments, I could only joined my mother on Saturday night.

This time, the room was on the 43rd level of Tower 1 building.

It had the most spectacular facing we ever had. It overlooked Garden by the Bay at the bedroom’s full-height windows and the bathtub windows displayed the sights at the Singapore River where the glassy Louis Vuitton flagship store and Arts Science Museum were located. 

I no longer use a DSLR to document my life. I miss the bokeh and the prettier images but iPhone is just too convenient.

We went for breakfast at Paiza Sky Residence which was located on the 55th floor of Tower 2.

We had the choice of dining at Rise restaurant but I had tried the breakfast at Rise once and the experience was not fantastic. We were there past 10 and the staff only told us, after we were seated at 10.15am, that breakfast ended at 10.30am! 

We had to scramble to get our food first before settling down to have our breakfast at 10.30am.

The breakfast was an ordinary continental fare. Nothing worth shouting about. So we revert to the 55th floor’s breakfast from then on.

The food offered there is more curated. For example, the fried rice would be infused with an exotic but pleasant flavour or paired with unusual but palatable ingredients like otah. The danishes would not be your uncreative peach danish. I normally don’t eat the Vietnamese pho but I enjoyed it a lot that morning with tender beef pieces.

Where the staples and meats are

Fried rice with otah

Ramen

Platters of pastries

Honeycomb and bread-and-butter station

Cheeses and salad station which I almost never touch

Japanese station 

Cakes and sweets

Egg tarts

Pancakes and waffles

Ice cream flavours

A limousine, as they call it, sent my mother to church

The first time I took it, I told my sister via text that it was an MPV.

She was shocked and asked me to take a picture for her.

She told me that this is a 'limousine'.

My idea of a limousine remains as a long bodied car with six doors. 

We returned at 3pm for the afternoon tea (2.30-4pm).

The tea set came in a pretty rotatable tier set with warm scones on the side.

I had had it a few times and I always thought MBS served the worst afternoon tea but this time, I was able to eat most of them without having to cringe before eating.

MBS gave two tickets each for the sampan boat ride and the Digital Light Canvas

Booking a 5pm slot would allow you to enjoy the waterfall/fountain upclose

Colour the given templates with crayons provided and pass your coloured image to the staff who would scan it so that it comes alive with the lights.

Writing your name on the image helps to identify your image quickly.

Children love to run around and chase and step on the images to disperse them. They even make friends and play with one another.

The Evening Beverages and Canapes started at 4.30pm and ended at 7pm. I only realised that at 6.25pm! We had to rush back to Paiza Sky Residence and get as much food as we could before commencing to eat.

pho with beef slices and meatball

Lobster sushi, fish and beef cheek

roast meat, chicken chop cute and two other items I can't recall

Chicken chop cube and almond prawn ball

Desserts

This was so pretty I had to take a close-up of it

After dinner past 8, my mother went to the casino till 12.45am. I had fallen asleep by then and couldn't pick her up. She followed a lady who was at the casino back.

The next morning was a Monday. I left the hotel early for work while my 5th sister came at 9am to have breakfast with my mother before they left for home together in a limousine at 12pm again.

I Am Back, With A PoGo Story

After a l-o-n-g hiatus, I am back.

I have been preoccupied with playing Pokemon Go, if you are wondering.

I realised that most of the last posts were about my PoGo experiences and I didn't want to turn my blog into a PoGo blog!

However, playing PoGo has been an interesting journey and it has shown me my dark side in a few instances.

One of the most unforgettable experiences was the time when a 97IV Chansey spawned in a power plant.

Many of us reached there just to realise that Chansey had spawned far too in and most of us could not get Chansey on our phone screen. However, none of us was willing to leave without getting her as that was the highest-IV ever in the whole history of Singapore PoGo then.

Then something happened. One of the ladies was swinging her arm upwards as she spoke when Chansey appeared on her screen!

Everybody started swinging his arm like crazy! One of my friends got it too! And the rest of us swung our arms even more frantically!

The lady who caught Chansey first stood a few feet away from us and remarked,"If the monkeys at Upper Thomson see us, they will laugh at us!"

It really was a silly sight!

Then someone managed to play with the WiFi and got Chansey on his screen!

Everybody started crowding around him and asked him how to do it. Then subsequently, people simply pushed their handphones to him and asked him to do it for them!

Seeing that I had no hope of getting any help, I continued to stick myself to the fence and tried to get close to Chansey who was spawning within.

Then suddenly, a guy came over and told my friend and me,"Eh, I got it already." When quizzed how he did it, he said he went in through an unlocked gate and came out from it!

The gate had always been there but everybody had assumed that it must have been locked.

Someone had tried his luck and realised that the gate was unlocked!

Everybody started streaming in quietly and caught Chansey on the quiet.

I had reached the place with 16 minutes to spare but by the time I sneaked into the premise, I was left with 4 minutes!

After Chansey despawned, we left the place and latched the gate.

Then another friend who had gone by the front gate released her exasperation on a group chat, saying that a forklift guy stopped her and 3 other trainers from entering the premise while a group of trainers had been allowed inside.

It suddenly dawned on me that I had trespassed a private property!

The law-abiding me trespassed a property for a Pokemon! Under normal circumstances, I would never have done so, but I had broken the law even without myself realising it!

However, this experience remains one of the most unforgettable in my PoGo journey. Just about unrivaled.

Days without sgpokemap

The days without Lapras, Snorlax and Chansey are long ...

 

So bored was I that I actually went out to get the Hitmon brothers.

 

Some Pokemon Go players accuse those who use maps to find out where the mons are as hypocrites, that we condemn cheaters who play by spoofing and botting but we are actually using a device that is made possible because someone else spoofs on our behalf.

I think that's crazy. 

Can I then say that all students cheat because they have textbooks or materials for exam preparation? Someone else has written the answers in those books or materials so if any student uses them, he is a cheater.

It's what you do with the device that matters.

So what if I see the mons on the map? I don't move a joystick and get myself to a Dragonite 10km away in five seconds and catch it at the tap of my finger.

The map is just for me to check if there are any rare mons near me within a reasonable span of time so that I could run for it and be there physically to catch it.

Pokemon Go is, like any other game, just a game. We use aiding devices like maps to help us detect the mons. How's that cheating? Walking around aimlessly and hoping to bump into a rare is not my idea of fun. 

It's plain stupid.

Down

The world of Pokemon players would have known that the God-sent sgpokemap has been down since last Friday night.

I have tried using Go Radar as an alternative but I realised it doesn't show 90% of the mons! And when it does show any, the time left is often too little for me to run to the mons.

This morning, I saw Lickitung in my Sightings window.

I decided to run to the pokestops it has ever spawned at, but it was quite tiring as it has spawned at different pokestops for the three or four times it spawned at my place.

After running about for more than five minutes, I finally found it outside a multi-storey carpark, a new spawning spot!

 

I met another player looking for Lickitung and directed him to the spot.

Without a good map, it's really exhausting and sometimes disappointing in the search for the mons.

Because of the frequent spawning of rare mons in my neighbourhood, I would imagine them spawning lonely at certain spots and only privy to those living in those areas while the rest of us are none the wiser.

I hope sgpokemap will be back. 

All in a Day's Catch

Since I have completed the 141 Pokedex for Pokemons that can be found in Singapore, the only mons that I run after now are the rares.

I also help my friend and youngest sister who live in areas that are starved of Pokemons to complete their Pokedex by catching the rares for them.

I saw a Ninetales not too far from my place yesterday and decided to pick it up for my sister. 

It was a difficult catch for her as her trainer level was comparatively low while the Ninetales was a high-CP one. It was only captured after 18 berries and Ultra Balls.

As I was catching it, I noted that there was a notification about Charizard having a time extension in a building a few bus-stops away.

It occurred to me that there was a bus-stop nearby and I decided to go try my luck. If the bus happened to come by, I would have a good chance catching it.

Sure enough. The bus came before I could cross the road, but the nice Indian bus-driver waited for me before he moved off.

As I ran into the compound, a thought that had never crossed my mind struck me,"Am I trespassing?" 

But I quickly dismissed it, telling myself that I would be shooed away if I were and it would be fine for me to go off if it was a mistake on my part.

As the timer started counting down to one minute and thirty seconds, I realised I was moving farther from the Charizard spot. I decided to move nearer to the spot by entering the building since I was already there.

As I walked quickly into the building, some young ladies dashed out from the left door and ran towards a designated spot! "They must be running for Charizard!" I thought, and ran after them.

It turned out that they were running for their company transport after work!

But incidentally, it was the correct place where Charizard was at.

 

 

 Phew!

In the evening, I received a Twitter notification that there was a Lapras and Chansey nearby. 

I rushed out immediately and nabbed the pathetic-CP Lapras but missed out on Chansey as she seemed to have been programmed to run away after the first ball.

Before I started catching Chansey, I heard a guy telling his friend,"One ball and it ran away!" 

I decided to use the Ultra Ball even though it was a low-CP Chansey.

True enough. She broke free and fled after one ball!

As I left the place, a lady told her friend the same thing,"One ball and she ran away ..."

 

Sigh ...

It's the first Chansey I didn't manage to catch.

As I was walking back, I felt a little disheartened. To add insult to injury, I noticed that Snorlax was at a mall two train stations away. As I was lamenting to my friend about it, the idea struck me,"Hey, I am near the train station. I can give Snorlaxa try!" and off I went.

 

The big boy who rarely disappoints after my disappointing Lapras catch and my fleeing Chansey!

Night came and I dozed off on the couch. William shook me,"Eh eh! Got Charizard where we got Porygon leh!"

Huh ... ??

Oh okay ...

I put on my running shoes and walked quickly to the designated spot with him and caught a pathetic Charizard.

 

At 12am, you'd think people are supposed to be asleep.

It was awfully crowded with a line of vehicles at the turn of the road. Honking has become a usual feature where rare mons reside.

Then I needed the toilet at a mall nearby. Although there was an Arcanine beside it, I didn't mean to catch it. 

But the crowd that followed made it impossible to resist.

 

While I am at the rares, I might as well mention that I also nabbed a Porygon yesterday earlier in the day.

I had cooked fusilli for lunch following the recipe I posted.

As Baby and I were eating, a Twitter notification about a Porygon's appearance some minutes of run away came.

As I rushed out of the door, I saw Baby putting a cover over my bowl of pasta to keep it warm!

How can I not love her?

 

So there you go, my day of rare catches!

Exploration

 

I was chasing Lapras when I realised it was going to be a fruitless effort.

I alighted the bus and started the journey home.

On my way back, I saw on the map that there were small and narrow routes that I had never bothered to explore but there have been occasional sightings of Aerodactyle and perhaps one other rare mon on these routes.

So I decided to slow down and looked around.

I happened to spot this fine stump which reminded me of 'The Giving Tree'.

Incidentally, I wondered if I have become a stump for giving of myself so much to my siblings.

I thought it could make a fine spot for Coco and Baby to take pictures at!

Alas, it was on a steep slope! Nice pictures are not worth risking a life for.

 

I live beside a somewhat lush forest, and some areas are not that densely occupied by greenery. I decided to venture into the safer part of the forest beside the road.

I discovered a saga seed tree with very few seeds on the ground thickly covered by dead leaves.

 

And I saw some beautiful, quaint houses. 

I walked up a short flight of steps leading to more of such houses.

Unfortunately, there was a sign at the end of the steps prohibiting photography and feeding of wildlife. I had to respect that.

The area looked like a quiet world where time had stood still. Each bungalow had a plot of land of its own. Each house was oozing 'privacy'.

The roads were clean and quiet. Only one Caucasian man was standing around, seemingly to be waiting for someone. When he saw me, he acknowledged my presence by nodding his head at me and mouthing 'hello'.

I walked slowly on the quiet road that was otherwise undisturbed.

It reminded me of the countryside in some European countries.

Having lived in the estate for more than 10 years, I have not explored this part of the neighbourhood. I had always thought it was a private housing area and I could be charged for trespassing if I ever walked up.

If not for Pokemon Go, I don't think I would ever have the guts to explore this part of my neighbourhood.